Chinese entrepreneurs give dockless bikes a big push

Zhang Yanqi founded Ofo when he was a student. Bike sharing has exploded in popularity in ChinaTimes photographer Ben Gurr

Britain’s streets could soon be flooded with yellow bicycles under plans by Ofo, a Beijing startup dubbed the Uber for bikes, to entrench the Chinese craze for dockless bike-sharing in Britain.

Shared bikes have exploded in popularity across Chinese cities in the past year and an estimated 2.4 million are used in Beijing alone, serving a population of 21 million.

But with rampant growth and thousands of bikes being left in crowded public spaces, local authorities in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen have demanded that the companies stop adding new bikes, prompting them to look overseas.

Ofo already has several hundred bicycles in Oxford, Cambridge and Norwich as well as the London boroughs of Islington and Hackney and has ambitious expansion plans.